I don’t need to re-write or summerise this press release from The Craftivist collective: read it, and

To mark the start of London Fashion Week 2012, activist group The Craftivist Collective has created hand stitched Mini Protest Banners aimed at exposing the ugly side of fashion. These eye-catching Mini Protest Banners are being displayed around London during London Fashion Week in support of the Love Fashion Hate Sweatshops campaign. The idea behind the banners is to make people think about the side of the fashion that is often too easily dismissed by the industry, in a non-threatening but challenging way.

Sarah Corbett, 28, of Battersea and founder of the Craftivist Collective says “I love the beauty and creativity that comes from fashion and I eagerly await the latest issue of Vogue every month, but I am so saddened that the workers who create the clothes we wear are often underpaid and made to work in such horrendous conditions. We shouldn’t ignore this ugly side of fashion”.

One banner at Somerset House reads: “Lowest paid models at London Fashion Week paid £125 an hour. Majority of garment workers in Vietnam paid £25 a month”. Another, hung outside Reiss on the Kings Road (a favourite of Kate Middleton’s) reads “The ugly side of fashion: Reiss profits are £8.5 million. Reiss garment workers in Romania get 99p an hour… Why is it so unequal?”

Grazia says: “Commissioned by the Mayor of London, in partnership with BT, the British Fashion Council, the London 2012 Festival, and *coughs modestly* Grazia magazine… Hatwalk saw 21 hats by the best of UK milliners displayed on iconic statues across the capital.”

All I was doing during the Olympics was WATCHING SPORT. What a waste of my time! I could have been scouting out THIS!